- Today, I have a simple mission.
What is the best deal in gaming?
Starting with the PlayStation 5.
Now, when you think gaming,
odds are PlayStation comes to mind really quickly.
But how good is it on the scale
of our patented not This Is, don't worry,
there's not Matt's face underneath this,
tier list to determine
what the best deal in gaming truly is.
So the PS5 Slim comes in at $450
for the all digital version.
This kind of claims to be the ultimate in gaming.
So we're gonna start out with Gran Turismo 7,
which I'll be honest, it's pretty much the killer app
for the PS5 as far as I'm concerned.
- [Alex] Killer app,
you've never played God of War,
you've never played Spiderman.
- No, I play racing games. - You never, ugh.
- With the PS5, what you're getting here is
what I would say is the default console.
The PS5 gives you a great selection of games.
You have full backwards compatibility with PS4 games.
It definitely helps that this is a console
that you know you can depend on for years down the line.
Games are still being designed specifically
with the PS5 in mind
and that is not gonna change
for another what, four, or five years.
So that's a big win.
Now the price is expensive, $450 for this.
It is expensive,
but compared to some of the other things on this list,
it is certainly not egregious.
So I gotta say, when it comes to ranking the PS5,
I don't think there's any way I can rank it
anything less than A tier, like it's solid, dependable.
If you're looking for the best deal in gaming,
while it's not the best outright bargain,
it's one of the absolute best all rounders.
Now we can't talk about the best deal in gaming
without discussing the Steam Deck.
Now I am a big fan of the Steam Deck
and I actually wasn't originally,
it kind of took a little while for it to grow on me,
but there's a lot to like here.
So there are a ton of different Steam Decks available,
including everything from a refurbished Steam Deck,
which you can get for less than $300
all the way up to a brand new OLED,
which would come in at $650 on the high end.
If you're looking for the best deal in handheld gaming,
the Steam Deck has a very strong value proposition.
Now I'm gonna be playing on an OLED here.
The main advantages here is
that it has a much better display, bigger battery,
and a lot of nice little quality of life improvements.
Out of the box, it runs SteamOS, which is based on Linux
and it is very much meant to be like a console experience.
You know, you don't need to pull out like a touch keyboard
and all that kind of stuff very often.
It's very navigable with the controller.
If you want, you can hop out to the Linux mode
and get the full desktop.
You can plug this into a monitor, into display.
In fact, you can even load Windows on this if you want.
Don't do that.
Now when it comes to performance,
it is certainly not going to blow you away with, you know,
4K graphics and everything,
but I will say that the majority of games on Steam will run
fairly well on Steam Deck.
But where do we rank the Steam Deck?
Because it is a terrific device in every single version.
I mean, you can get the base model and upgrade it.
You can get the OLED,
like even the most expensive version of the Steam Deck
is still actually a pretty decent deal
just because it is such a solid piece of hardware
and it will work for at least several years down the line.
I'm actually just gonna give it an A.
(techno music)
Uh-oh.
The next best deal in gaming is one
that I actually think is low key,
one of the best legitimate deals,
which is the Meta Quest 2.
Now this used to run for, what was it,
3 or $400 when it first came out.
However, it is now officially 199 at Best Buy
and the vast majority of Quest games
that have been built over the years are designed
for this headset.
They're gonna look a little bit better on the Quest 3,
but that's $500 plus.
This starts to look like a very, very compelling value.
When it comes to the Quest 2,
this is a headset which yes,
it's gonna be a little bit out of date.
We gotta consider this is
what like 1/20th the price of Apple Vision.
And when you look at them side by side, yeah,
the passthrough and a bunch of individual items
on this aren't as nice,
but once you actually get into a game,
something that's designed for it like Superhot,
it feels terrific.
The audio is good, the screen is a little blurry,
but it's not too bad.
Look, there's only one way to play this game
and it's to punch him in the nuts.
(glass breaking)
Ah, he punched me in the face.
Now I'm gonna lean over this guy right here, right?
Punch him in the nuts before he can get me.
Punch him in the nuts and in the face.
If you wanna get into a VR headset,
$200 is such a killer deal.
One of the only downsides here is going
to be long-term support.
But at $200, if you've ever been like curious about VR,
it is a terrific way to get into it
and you can always decide maybe down the line,
do you actually wanna spend the extra money
to get the Quest 3, which is really just a
more refined version of this headset.
I'm gonna put the Quest 2 in B Tier.
It's good if you want to get that VR experience,
but if you got $200 in one gaming device of your life,
this is probably not going to be it.
Keeping with the theme of unusual choices,
this is the Analogue Pocket.
The Analogue Pocket is unlike every other item in this video
because it only plays old school portable games.
So we're talking Game Boy, Game Boy Color, Game Boy Advance.
You can get a number of other adapters
to do things like Game Gear and Atari Lynx and whatnot.
You have a ton of different options
and the nice thing is this display is so sharp
that especially when you're playing original Game Boy games,
you can actually have like the original display,
the LCD stuff like emulated in the actual hardware
because the screen is so high resolution.
But!
There's a big but.
The Analogue Pocket has two major things going against it.
First of all, it is the availability.
So, the Analogue Pocket is not just something you can go
on the Analogue site and buy.
If they were in stock
and you could get it for the actual $220 price, it's decent.
The fact that you almost always can't means
that the Pocket, I'm sad to say, this one's tough.
I'm gonna say Analogue Pocket gets a D.
Next up, we have the ROG Ally.
Now this is going to encompass a couple of other options
including something like the Legion Go,
but this is a Windows based handheld, essentially a small PC
that is designed to go head to head with the Steam Deck.
Now I'll tell you that the ROG Ally was the first
and is currently the best priced of the lot.
I'll tell you straight up,
the standard Z1 version of the Ally
at $400 is an incredibly compelling value
when you put it side by side with a Steam Deck.
So the hardware is quite nice, it's got a very nice display,
a little on the bigger side,
much like all these handhelds are,
the fan is a little bit loud
and there are some issues
with this cooking, like microSD cards.
There's really not a lot that is wrong,
I would say with the ROG Ally.
And there are some issues with this cooking,
like microSD cards. There is Armory Crate built in.
So you can see here that with just a tap of a button,
I can launch a little interface that ASUS have built.
But here's the bigger issue with the Ally,
and this goes true with all the other Windows handhelds,
they're running Windows.
When you compare this to the Steam Deck,
Steam OS is actually designed
to be used with a controller.
As soon as you land in the desktop mode,
what you're gonna find is a very unfriendly experience.
Yes, you can kind of just forget that Windows is there
mostly, but you can't ever get away from it,
which definitely dings it in my book.
It's a good deal.
But is it the best deal in gaming?
No.
I'm gonna give the Ally pretty much entirely
based on the fact is that the Z1 is $400.
I'm gonna give it a C tier.
Now when you see this gaming laptop on the table,
you'll probably go, "Oh, Austin,
you're finally talking about a PC.
I'm so happy."
Well, I am talking about a PC.
Running Chrome OS.
Yeah, you heard me right, my friends.
This is a Lenovo IdeaPad gaming Chromebook.
Now if you hear the words
gaming and Chromebook and go, "Huh?"
Well, you're not alone.
These were originally designed to run
with Google Stadia in mind.
So if you're familiar with Chrome OS,
you'll know that they're nice little systems
that are easy, you know, very lightweight,
simple sort of things and you can run some games on them.
In fact, some Chromebooks can actually run Steam,
but they're always limited by their sort of wimpy hardware.
Gaming Chromebooks like this actually utilize
a high refresh rate display.
So this is 1440P at 120 hertz.
And when you pair that with a service such as GeForce Now,
which is what I'm using and the ultimate tier,
I can actually get 120 frames per second streaming to it.
If you are interested in doing streaming gaming,
I think that this Chromebook actually is as good as it gets.
The downside though is
if you have a poor internet connection,
it is not a great experience.
I will tell you that if you have
a sort of weak, wimpy internet connection,
it's gonna be an F- tier.
I'm gonna hop into GeForce Now.
I'm gonna give you the best possible shot.
I've got the high end ultimate tier.
I've got an RTX 4080 in the cloud,
and as you'll see the performance
should be really quite nice.
I usually don't like cloud gaming, I'll be honest with you.
I find that the inconsistency even on a good connection
and the latency can often be really annoying.
That being said, as you can see right here,
I'm getting some stutters
and that is going to be dependent
on not only the server you're on,
but also just your internet connection.
If someone down the hall fires up Netflix,
your game may start lagging, which is always going
to be a pretty significant issue
when it comes to cloud gaming.
Wow, that was really not good.
While this used to cost like $600,
you can buy this brand new for a little over 400
and if you're like me, you wanna buy it used.
This thing cost me like 200 bucks,
but you still gotta pay for your games, your online cloud,
streaming service, all that kind of stuff.
As you can see, sometimes it runs terribly.
So, as much as I think
for some people, this is one of the better items,
but when you look at what it's up against,
I think we gotta put the Chromebook in F.
It's not this worst except that it is, but, you know,
it's a Chromebook!
When I think about value
and gaming in one sentence,
the first words that come to mind, Nintendo Switch Lite.
Now, you're probably tired of hearing me talk about
how much I like this stupid Switch Lite,
but here's the thing, this has been $200
for a number of years now
and it is still purely from a value to game perspective.
One of the best consoles you can buy.
The Switch has at this point years and years
and years of terrific games.
Now obviously, it's starting to show its age a little bit.
We hop into something like Fortnite,
you'll see that the experience isn't particularly amazing.
Boy, this screen's real small for Fortnite.
Boy, that frame rate is, there's some frames.
- [Alex] There are exactly some frames.
- How many frames do you need?
(Alex laughs)
- [Joanna] Less than 30.
- Less than 30.
Who wants 30 frame?
Oh, that's too many frames.
Oh, now while the Switch Lite might be cheap and small,
it still plays the exact same games
and the exact same performance as its bigger brothers.
The standard Switch and the Switch OLED.
While, yes, the Switch 2 is right on the horizon.
You're not gonna feel too bad
about spending 200 bucks on a Switch Lite.
Whereas if you spend 300, $350 on a Switch OLED right now,
you know that Switch 2 is coming out in like 10 minutes
and is gonna completely disregard your existing Switch.
Even if there's backwards compatibility and stuff.
Like, you should not buy a regular Switch in 2024, right?
Like the new one's coming.
Now when it comes to downsides to the Switch Lite,
there are a couple.
The screen is decidedly average.
It's a very sort of okay looking 720P panel
and the fact that while the Switch Lite is
a beautiful little piece of hardware,
you do not have any capability of docking it.
This is one that's very subjective.
There's probably people out there who look at this
and go, "Oh, I can't dock it.
It's the weak version of the Switch."
F Tier easy.
And then there's me like a year ago,
which would've been like, "Oh, S tier.
It's the best deal in gaming."
I made lots of videos on the Switch Lite over the years.
I think though I have moderated my stance somewhat.
I feel pretty confident giving the Switch Lite a B tier.
I think $200 for the Quest and the Switch, you'll be set.
You'll have all the gaming you need
except all the other things.
So when I say that I'm talking about an iPhone 15 Pro
as the best deal in gaming,
you rightfully are gonna point out
that belongs in F tier along with the Chromebook.
But hear me out for one second.
This is one of, if not the most expensive items,
in the video.
So the iPhone 15 starts at $1,000 plus
you're gonna probably want more storage,
could be another a hundred, $200,
and you're almost definitely going to want a controller.
So this is a Backbone which is another hundred, right?
So you look at all this and you go like,
"Oh, what's going on here?"
The reason why I point out the iPhone 15 Pro is
that this phone is the first time in my opinion,
that we've had a smartphone
that can actually play some proper AAA games.
This is Death Stranding running natively
on the iPhone 15 Pro.
Unlike some of the other items on this list
that, you know, the Switch is only a game console,
so you have to judge it based on that.
You're spending that money also on like the camera
and the screen to watch videos and stuff,
which I think you could maybe make the argument
that you need a smartphone anyway.
I'll tell you what though,
this is like a really solid experience.
Now I've not really played much of Death Stranding,
but from what I have done,
while it's a little bit on the low res side,
it looks phenomenal
for the fact that it's running on an iPhone.
Plus, you have a lot of other games
besides just the AAA stuff.
And let's be honest, mobile gaming is the most popular
and certainly the most profitable form of gaming period.
I mean, iPhones and Androids have, oh, I don't know,
400,000 exclusives
that are not on any other console on this list.
If I can take the device that lives in my pocket 24/7
and also do pretty solid gaming on it,
it's a very, very strong sales pitch.
The downsides though are there.
So not only do you have to spend
a huge amount of money on an iPhone 15 Pro
if you want to have the latest and greatest performance.
The problem is, is that once you start getting away
from these AAA games,
which are very limited on the iPhone but exist,
which you'll find is that free to play games have
a bad reputation for a reason.
I think as much as I like smartphones and the iPhone 15,
kinda lumping 'em together,
I gotta put the iPhone in D tier.
- [Joanna] Where would you rank the NOOK?
- The Barnes and Noble NOOK tablet?
- [Joanna] Yes.
- Oh, well, that's an N tier...for not good.
It is the moment that you've all been waiting for,
my friends.
Time to talk PC.
Now PC is a little bit more of a nuanced conversation
than every other item on this list.
If you encompass a PC gaming experience
down to a few criteria.
You would look at laptops, low end desktops,
you would look at high end desktops, crazy extreme stuff.
PC is almost without fail,
the best place to play if you've got the budget for it.
We're actually gonna split this up into two categories.
We're gonna start out with the low end PC.
So this is a brand new $475 PC
that I built in a video not too long ago,
the cheapest new PC I could build at Micro Center.
But we're gonna compare this with something like the PS5
and the Series X, which is roughly equivalent on price,
although I'll tell you not equivalent in performance.
I would say, the low end PC is probably the 4 to $600 range.
Obviously, it's really hard to determine
'cause I mean, you can technically build a $200 PC
if you want, if you get like a used Dell Optiplex
for like 30 bucks.
So, I actually can hit close to 120 FPS
on this even though it is obviously a very low end system.
But obviously, the more money you spend,
the sort of more capability that you will get.
- [Ken] I think for me, the only real downside
with PC is that it has League of Legends.
(Austin laughs)
- Well, you know what we can do?
We can just delete League.
I think it'd be fine.
Downsides to PC would be the complication.
You know, you've got Windows updates,
you've got driver updates,
you've got occasional instability
based on the many components that you may or not have.
PCs, I don't wanna say need to be upgraded more often
'cause that's not really true.
But like this PC I will guarantee you seven years from now
will struggle to play some more modern titles.
Like that's just the way it works.
PC tend to evolve a little bit quicker.
So if we're gonna split this up,
first of all into low end PC, there are a lot of advantages,
but I'm actually not gonna give it a super high rating
because when you go for a really low end PC,
you're gonna be giving up pretty significant performance,
meaning that I'm gonna give the low end PC a B.
It's fine, it's very usable.
You can certainly get a lot out of it.
But the real story here is the high-end PC.
Now a high-end PC, I'm gonna categorize
as something at $750 or more.
At this kind of price point,
you're getting proper dedicated graphics
that are going to match or exceed a console.
And importantly, once you get to a more high-end PC,
while you'll still wanna upgrade,
that is going to last you four or five years.
If you've noticed there's this conspicuous lack of an S tier
and the PC feels like a very obvious spot
'cause there's so much going for it,
which is why I'm going to put PC
in A tier because there was one more.
The real GOAT.
When it comes to the best deal in gaming,
not the best experience.
If it was just the best experience in gaming,
it would be the high-end PC.
It is none other than...
(drum rolls)
The Xbox Series S.
- [Ken] Get out of here.
(audience booing)
- Hear me out.
When you hear why.
- [Ken] Is it because it's S?
So you put it in S tier?
- No.
Let me give you the pitch.
Ah! On why the Series S is great.
Are people are, what the hell?
The price of the Series S, MSRP is 299.
Now could we just take a minute
and just think about that as a concept?
A brand new current generation game console able
to play pretty much every game
that it's bigger brothers can for $250 or even less.
Now, are there some downsides to the Series S?
You better believe it.
First of all, no disc drive,
but honestly, most people,
are you really still buying physical Xbox games?
But if you're looking for the best deal in gaming,
I'm happy to trade this compatibility
for hundreds of dollars in savings.
Now the other downside to the Series S is just the fact
that it is a little bit underpowered
compared to the Series X.
So this is going to generally play games somewhere
between 1080P and 1440P,
whereas the Series X typically aims for 4K or thereabouts.
I would argue
that because that is really the only downside
to the system when it comes to the graphics,
it's totally fine.
The fact that the Series S can play the same games
and you're pretty much guaranteed that this will work
with all next gen titles
and current gen titles for quite a while.
That's legitimately great.
On top of that, there's Game Pass.
If there's ever been a console to sign up
for a Game Pass subscription, it's the Series S.
Or you can do what a lot of people do, which is just,
you know, freaking play Fortnite
and free to play games on this thing
and never buy anything on it.
Like there's so many reasons why this Series S is
such a good deal when you consider
this is just a little bit more expensive than a Switch Lite.
The concept of this video is
what is the best deal in gaming?
I don't care about any of the other stuff.
What is the best deal in gaming?
And I think it's easy to say
that the Xbox Series S
is the best deal
in gaming in 2024.
Thank you very much for watching.
Let me know what you think in the comments
below of this tier list.
Tell me why I'm wrong about all of them.
I don't know.
All I know is this, Series S,
S Tier.
(bright music)
Well, until you die.
At which point, you need that 120 FPS.
(Austin laughs)
(bright music)